We want Jesus to teach us how to love like it takes a methodology or more faith than we have. Instead, Jesus shows how that misses the point.
Jesus and the teaching of uncommon forgiveness
Proper 22C
Luke 17:1-10
We jump into the story with the apostles shouting “Increase our faith!” It makes it all sound random. They’re clearly responding to something.
Remember Jesus is talking about discipleship, widening the circle, and seeing God’s love beyond human expectations. Hold onto that.
So after finishing that amazing parable from last week about a rich man separating himself from the poor, Jesus speaks directly to that sin. And how not to fall victim to it.
“Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Occasions for stumbling are bound to come, but woe to anyone by whom they come! It would be better for you if a millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea than for you to cause one of these little ones to stumble.”
In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus teaches his followers not to be a stumbling block. I imagine the sneaky jerk hiding where someone won’t see him and throwing his body right in front of another person’s feet.
And when the person trips and falls, they jump up and laugh at them. Or judge them for tripping.
But Jesus continues:
“Be on your guard! If another disciple sins, you must rebuke the offender, and if there is repentance, you must forgive. And if the same person sins against you seven times a day, and turns back to you seven times and says, “I repent”, you must forgive.’”
That’s when the followers demand that Jesus increase their faith. Because the prospect of not screwing up someone else, rebuking a friend for their sin, and then if they repent, forgiving them for it. Over and over! Who can do all that? Only Jesus, right?
A Demand
There are two ways to read their demand. And notice it isn’t a request—they don’t say “please”. They say “Increase our faith!”
Either they mean it literally or instructively.
If it’s instructively, then they are asking for help. Like when they ask Jesus to teach them to pray. Help us build up this incredible faith we would need to even attempt to do what you are asking of us.
But if it is literal, and it very well could be, then they are asking for Jesus to magically increase their faith capacity.
And my friends, this is a really cool request.
Apostles
Notice that it says at the beginning of verse 5 that “the apostles” make this request. The author usually refers to them as disciples. Now this could be an interesting slip, but I don’t think so.
Four times in this gospel account, the author we call Luke refers to the closest followers of Jesus as apostles instead of disciples. Four times.
- The first is in chapter 9. Jesus empowers the twelve to do the work he would do if he could be everywhere at once. When they get back from doing Jesus work, they are referred to as apostles.
- This, chapter 17 is the second time.
- Chapter 22, at the last supper, when Jesus is commissioning them, is the third.
- And chapter 24, at the resurrection, is the fourth.
In the three other times, Jesus’s closest followers are referred to as apostles when they are being given power and authority to offer the world the very love of Jesus.
So here they are, being told what is ahead of them. And Jesus is trying to help them understand the nature of God’s mission, the missio dei. They are apostles asking for more power.
And Jesus’s response is to say you already have more than enough.
More Faith, More Love
This reminds me of how I felt before my daughter was born. I, like a lot of parents-to-be, was worried that I wouldn’t know how to love her. In fact, I was afraid that I wouldn’t.
But when I saw her and we waited for the first cry and the midwife was asking if I’d like to cut the umbilical cord my first response was
That’s my baby! You’re not going to make me hurt her! Ever!
No question—there was plenty of love. Love that I didn’t even know was there.
And then later I worried that I wouldn’t have enough of that love for my son. It’s the same fear of scarcity and shallowness. That I am too weak a human to possibly love these two gifts from God.
But guess what? There was more love.
I didn’t need to pray to God that the Spirit give me more love, like the Trinity’s being stingy with the tap water. Turn that sucker on all the way!
It was there. Always, already there. All the love I needed.
Jesus paints the apostles as foolish because they already know. They’ve already shared the love of God. There’s no economy of scarcity with grace. It is already there.
A Self-Help Faith
The reason the disciples ask for this help isn’t that they’re stupid. But just like us, they struggle to see the kin-dom’s perfection behind an economy of scarcity. A view of the world in which we’re never good enough, someone’s always better off, and our neighbors keep screwing up.
Since the 1960s, we’ve seen a wide variety of ways people are seeking a better, more potent faith.
People seek wisdom through other faith or spiritual traditions. We seek enlightenment through drugs, religionless spirituality, and personal growth. The self-help section of the book store exploded in the 1980s and the prosperity gospel in the 2000s.
And what we’re doing is trying to find our own answers to the question the apostles are trying to ask. How can we possibly live like you’re asking us to, Jesus? Or perhaps it’s even more fundamental than that.
How can we survive our world and forgive like that?
Forgiveness
We received a real-life parable this week at the trial of Amber Guyger who was convicted for the murder of Botham Jean. Jean’s brother, Brandt told his brother’s killer from the stand that he forgives her. And even more strikingly, he hugged her.
The pictures of them hugging are jarring and beautiful.
And those of us who follow Jesus’s way of love can see that as iconic. This is what forgiveness looks like.
But Jesus’s teaching is not about the icon. This story is about how the apostles respond to the icon.
Their demand: “increase our faith!” comes, not in facing their brother’s killer, but when Jesus says you need to keep forgiving a repentant sinner. It comes when they imagine having to do it themselves.
We, looking at Brandt Jean’s act of incredible mercy are these disciples. We are being confronted with true mercy. And dare we ask Jesus to throw some magic fairy dust on us so we can love like that? [Increase our faith!] Or run to the self-help section to fix ourselves?
Dare we ignore the most obvious truth that we think uncommon forgiveness is for other people?
Or that the gospel encourages forgiveness without repentance?
How often it’s the other way and there is no expectation for repentance or forgiveness!
Our fear, our scarcity mindset, our cruelty and rage and desire for vengeance, our indifference to unjust laws and systems, our pessimism and nihilism, our need to be right—we’re fools!
We’re fools who have enough faith to share uncommon love.
We’re apostles!
This is Jesus’s point. It isn’t about volume or capacity or flow of faith. Nor are we broken and useless vessels who only survive by the grace of God.
We are apostles! We bear the image of God and commit our lives to a single simple idea: that God’s kin-dom be here now.
And if you are here, right now, in this school of love, you are here to be reminded of this. That following the way of love means leading with love.
Some of us pour our love into thank you notes or food; some of us into time or gifts or kind words or presence at a moment of anxiety and fear.
But love has to lead the way. We don’t need to evaluate each other or trip each other up. Our love shouldn’t be about getting gold stars from Jesus or each other.
Lead with love, apostles! If a speck of faith is enough to uproot a tree and throw it into the sea, then I guarantee you have at least that much. Which is plenty to forgive people who annoy you.
Lead with love, apostles! The kin-dom is ours to make. The work is plentiful, the opportunity is always present, and the hope is everlasting.
Lead with love, apostles! Because the world needs it, our neighborhood needs our love. We need each other’s forgiveness and mercy. Jesus calls us into uncommon service to make love more common.
We are apostles. So it’s up to us to love and forgive.
It may seem crazy, but not to God. God’s cheering us on. Just do it! Start everything with love. And just go!
Here is a parable I wrote to reimagine what Jesus might say to us this week.